Yong Vui Kong, the Malaysian on death row in Singapore, is racing against time to save himself from the gallows as he is scheduled to be hanged tomorrow.
However, in the last bid to save his life, his lawyers have sent a letter of demand to the Malaysian government to refer the neighbouring island republic to the International Court of Justice for denying Yong due process of the law.
The letter, sent out by the firm of Edwin Lim Suren and Soh on Monday, was addressed to Foreign Affairs Minister Anifah Aman and copied to Attorney-General Abdul Gani Patail.
In the letter, the lawyers are giving the Malaysian government 48 hours to institute proceedings in the ICJ against its neighbour in order to preserve Yong's life, or else face legal action itself, said N Surendran, one of Yong's lawyers.
Suffering extreme prejudice
"Our client is suffering extreme prejudice and is in danger of his life. The period of his clemency petition expires tomorrow (Aug 26)," said Surendran, who represents a group of human rights lawyers called Lawyers for Liberty.
"We are instructed to insist that Malaysia institutes proceedings in the ICJ against Singapore and apply for the appropriate orders to preserve our client's life, within 48 hours from the date," he added.
"Failing which, we are constrained to commence legal action against the government to enforce our client's rights."
Yong, a 22-year-old Malaysian citizen currently on death row in yong vui kong death roll photo and eteSingapore's Changi prison, was convicted and sentenced to death for trafficking in 47.27gm of diamorphine in the island-city, an offence under section 5(1Xa) of the Misuse of Drugs Act.
His appeal against the sentence was dismissed by the Court of Appeal on May 14, and he is now due to submit a plea for clemency, a right under Article 22P of the republic's constitution.
Yong's case has attracted much public attention in Malaysia and Singapore, where a petition calling for his sentence to be commuted to life imprisonment collected more than 100,000 signatures.
His family submitted the petition to Singapore President SR Nathan at the Istana yesterday, but failed to meet the latter.
Singapore has insisted that it had followed the rule of law and had acted in no prejudicial manner when rejecting the clemency petition.
However, before the clemency petition was filed, Singapore Law Minister K. Shanmugam had made a public statement which was deemed "prejudicial", Yong's lawyer said.
Shanmugam was reported in the media to have said, "Yong Vui Kong, he is young. But if we say we let you go what's the signal we're sending? We're sending a signal to all drug barons out there... just make sure you choose a victim who's young or a mother of a young child and use them as the people to carry drugs into Singapore."
With the sympathy generated after these people are caught, he added, there would be a "whole unstoppable stream of people coming through, as long as we won't enforce our laws".
NONESurendran (right) said the statement was made before Yong filed his clemency petition and the rejection of his first clemency petition in November last year.
This in no way meant that Yong's second clemency petition, which was yet to be filed and heard, ought to be rejected automatically, he added.
"Yong's right to be heard must be upheld and due process must be adhered to," said Surendran.
"A recent decision of the Singapore High Court, which ruled that the president does not have discretion to pardon but must act on the advice of the cabinet, reinforces our argument, that the cabinet had made a decision on Yong's clemency before he could even be heard," he added
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